Echoes of Mercy
by Lily M. Richards
Summary: It takes Cas five days to find him. A clear, cold Friday and springtime announcing its arrival with a thousand pink blossoms that blur into peaceful equilibrium under the azure sky of a mid-dawn car-ride to Minnesota. - Spoilers for Season 7, Episode 17.


**A/N:** Thanks to the lovely **AphraelFT** for beta-ing :D This is my first ever Supernatural and Destiel fic, so go easy on me XD Took me months to write it because their characters are insanely difficult for me to write, seeing as I'm used to Glee... But yeah, I had fun writing this :) And it ended up a lot longer than I thought... so yeah. Enjoy and reviews make the world go round!

Further note: Thanks to SkyHighFan for correcting me on the demon, should be fixed now!

* * *

Angels descending, bring from above,  
Echoes of mercy, whispers of love.  
~Fanny J. Crosby

* * *

It takes Cas five days to find him. A clear, cold Friday and springtime announcing its arrival with a thousand pink blossoms that blur into peaceful equilibrium under the azure sky of a mid-dawn car-ride to Minnesota. Sam will follow tomorrow, with a hired car. For now, with his newfound sanity, Dean needs some peace and quiet from his once more untroubled brother.

He thinks he must be going soft, as he catches sight of spring blossoming outside and finds that it settles in him an inner peace he hasn't felt in weeks. When the rustle of feathers feels too close to be a mistaken rush of wind through the trees, he barely jumps anymore. And it surprises him how easily he's slipped back into this role with Cas. Except for the queasy feeling that now evermore presents itself in association with the angel.

"Shouldn't you be in a damn Mental Institution? I thought they'd lock you up securely there at least."

"Dean-"

"Are you still seeing your lovely brother everywhere? 'Cause that's definitely a reason to _stay_ locked up-"

"Dean."

Dean sighs, counts to ten, reminds himself that Cas is trying to atone, that he saved Sammy's life. Thinks of his younger brother when he was ten and Dean would've ripped apart anything trying to even so much as scratch him. Thinks things have hardly changed that in the years past. One day, he knows, something will get them. One day it'll be over and the last thing he'll see, he can only hope, is some sort of consolation in dead eyes of whatever will be the death of him. But Sam will be okay. And now is hardly the time to freak himself out like that.

"So how'd you convince Meg to let you fly off?"

"I told her what I needed to do."

"Which is?"

"Talk to you." Cas says matter-of-factly. All the humanity he seems to have gained believing he was, in fact, human, appears to have disappeared. Maybe insanity will do that to you. Maybe Dean will find out sometime. So far, going by the statistics, he is next in line.

"So what? You want me to say it's okay? That I forgive you for almost killing us? For killing all those other people? For killing _Bobby_?"

"No. But I think you should pull over."

Frustrated, Dean hits the steering wheel in front of him, biting back a thousand curses. He pulls over nonetheless. If Dean dies, it will be taking down as many fucking Leviathans as he can, not driving into a ditch, too agitated to stay on the road. It's the first time Dean has ever seen Cas use the car door, changing seats from the back to sit at the front. Facing Dean with something akin to regret, hurt, empathy, fear.

"I am truly sorry for everything Dean. That, you have to know. I was foolish. I disobeyed my father and my brothers. I went against everything I believed in."

"Just so we're clear. I am not hugging this out with you."

Cas whispers, "I should have died. After everything I've done… I don't deserve another chance." and it tugs at something in Dean's chest, because yeah, he missed the friggin' angel. Because when he found Cas again, there'd been that surge of happiness he'd felt in hospital with Bobby, seeing him wake up. For just a second. Seeing him take a last breath and make his parting statement. And with Cas, it had been the same all over again, except for that frustrating inner conflict. It was nothing new. He'd never found a resolve between wanting to punch the smug, trenchcoat-wearing bastard and wanting to hug him for being okay. For helping them. For saving them. The mark on his arm suddenly seemed to flare a little, as though someone had held an oven against it.

He thinks of something to say, then. Something not too sentimental, something that doesn't involve feelings. Thinks of _Don't say that_'s and _I missed you, you know_'s. In the end, what he says is "Well. You put us here. Gotta put it right again, right?"

He thinks he can almost hear Cas chuckle dryly.

"Whatever I can do. I'll fight. To whatever death will have me."

* * *

Dean sleeps on the hood of the Impala that night. Cas flutters back to his padded cell, tells Dean he'll come back tomorrow provided Lucifer doesn't trouble him. It amazes Dean how well Cas is handling the devil in his head, until Meg is there, wakes him with a malicious smile, wacking a piece of metal against the bumper in an eerie rhythm.

"Geez, what is your problem?", and she snickers, tells him it's the only faint amusement she can get these days except for jolts of pleasure seeing Cas writhing in pain, tormented by demons and devils in his head. Dean wants to crack her skull in, cause her pain. For a second it surprises him how ferocious her dismissal - her pure insane enjoyment at Cas' pain rather - pains him. He's forgotten how much he misses the angel's uncomprehending glances, the way he'll tilt his head in confusion at any pun or joke.

"I thought you were meant to, oh I dunno, watch over him? Not make his misery your goddamn amusement park."

"Why Dean," she smirks, an ugly sight, evil and familiar and sadistic all poured into the same expression, "I had no idea you reciprocated the feelings."

He makes no attempt to conceal his disgust at her, at memories of her dallying with his own _brother_, memories of all the times they tried to fucking kill her and she just kept insisting on coming back. "What are you on?"

"I just thought you should know that I'm letting him out again tomorrow. He seems a lot less bothered by his family when he's around you. Or sighing your name in his sleep." Again there's that snicker, but before Dean can make much sense of what she's saying, she's gone.

* * *

She keeps her promises after all. Cas' arrival is punctuated by the familiar sensation of rustling feathers and this time he's in the front seat and it makes Dean jump.

"I didn't mean to startle you." he says, voice weary, laden down with exhaustion, pain. It takes effort this time, for Dean to stay angry.

"Do you ever?" he says instead, fixed eyes on road, refusing to let one glance drift into Cas' direction because the bastard tried to kill them. No matter what, that isn't something he can let himself forget so easily.

So they drive in silence, letting the only sound of tires on tarmac drift between them like a tangible wall.

"Nothing to say today then?" Dean says finally, surprised himself at the anger in his voice.

"I have learnt from experience that you would not appreciate me trying to apologise again."

"One-Nil to the Angels."

Castiel frowns at the reference, wonders how the collective of him and his brothers fits into this, mulls it over in his head, and discards it as a pop-reference he will never cease to be puzzled by. It makes Dean smile for a split second.

"It gets easier. Around you."

"Huh?" Dean says, startled by this so much that the car swerves for a metre.

"My head. It's clearer when I'm around you. I don't see him anymore." Cas' voice adopts a different tone than usual as he says this. Cynical stoicism replaced with something like care, like gratitude.

"Well, colour me flattered." Dean mutters and the answering "You should be." has such amusement in the tone that Dean looks over, about to ask what the hell Cas is on about, but the angel is already gone.

* * *

They continue this routine for a few more weeks. Sam got caught up in his own chase of the shapeshifter they've been chasing, because there's now apparently two of them, robbing banks and killing whatever moves and looks pretty, not to mention that the Leviathan are having a nice spree of their own, accentuating every success of their leader's with a few corpses for afternoon tea.

Every time Cas comes to visit, he looks more worn out, circles appearing under his eyes and his movements becoming stiff, mechanical. By the time he leaves again, he's regained some colour and sometimes the facility to smile weakly.

* * *

Dean learns that forgiveness comes in baby steps with anyone who isn't his brother. There's still anger in his words when Cas appears, but it lessens day by day. By the time he leaves, all Dean feels is a twinge of it, stirring low in his stomach, not strong enough to cause damage anymore.

When the angel doesn't appear for a whole day once, Dean realises he's worrying. When he calls Castiel's name, only silence rebounds off the walls of the Impala. Outside, the rain continues to fall, another spring day holding summer at bay. Dean hates the sound of the pattering drops on the roof, hates the clouds that shimmer with the faint light behind them, trying to find a sliver of earth to brighten on this miserable day.

* * *

The day Dean forgives him is summer. The cicadas buzz in a field nearby and overhead, the pink sky is dotted with leftover clouds, biding their time before they will dissolve into the last showers of the dying season. Tomorrow, he and Sam will meet up again. Three weeks and loose ends regarding the Leviathans, Dean has decided that he doesn't care anymore. He and Sam work better as a team. Whether they succeed by tomorrow or not, they will regroup and carry on together.

"Hello Dean."

Dean jumps because he's been expecting this. Jumps because Cas is late, he realises, and it annoys him.

"Thought you'd come earlier."

"I wanted to. My plans were… complicated by some matters."

"He bothering you again then?" Dean says, reclining on the hood of the Impala because he's been sleeping in the car the last three days and it's starting to hurt his back, and Cas answers "He never stopped."

"Oh yeah. I forgot. I'm special, aren't I?" Cas either chooses to ignore the dry tone or fails to pick up on it. Going by his answer, Dean guesses the latter option. "You are."

For some reason Dean can't quite place, this annoys him.

"How come Sam was still having double visions around me then?" he spits, fixes a glare on Cas and this time, the angel sees, seems to almost recoil into the darkness that coils around him, wisps of the car's exhaust fumes that blend in with the young night, grasping for inches of the trench coat that seems more ill-fitted on Cas now. He's been losing weight from insanity. It shouldn't bother Dean. It _shouldn't_.

"I don't know. I'm sorry." Cas is wearing a weary look again, tiredness that makes his eyelids droop in staccato rhythm as he lowers his gaze, trying to blink away sleep. "My only guess is that we all have our own way of coping with situations. Sam is one of my Father's most loved creations. He was never intended to suffer as much pain as he has, but you hunters have developed an addiction to it. You need it to survive the pain you have suffered before."

"So what, you've become addicted to me, that it?" Dean scoffs.

"I suspect I have developed a liking for companionship, yes. It's a feeling so alien to me, we angels are not meant to interact with humans to the extent I have."

Dean lets it soak in, thinks of something to reply to this. He comes up with nothing, lets silence permeate the air once more, lets Castiel stand next to the Impala awkwardly again. He reminds himself that he doesn't care. That he _shouldn't_ care.

"I wish you would let go of your anger." Cas says quietly. "I wish you would quit reading my mind." Dean retorts, and that's it. By the time Dean looks back towards the figure, he is surrounded by darkness once more. In the stillness of the night, he silently wonders how he managed to become so unforgiving.

When Cas comes back an hour later, Dean hasn't shifted at all, but his head falls to the side slightly, Cas counts ten degrees, to acknowledge the angel's company again.

"You have to believe me," he says. "What I did. By the time I realised, I was too far gone, too far possessed."

"Cas. You told us to bow down or die. You proclaimed yourself a friggin' God. The Leviathan are out there because of you. Do you know how many people you've fucking killed?" Dean slides off the Impala, stalks around it, face to face with Cas he fights the childish impulse to spit him in the face and shoves him instead, hard.

And for the first time, Cas lets himself fall.

His back hits the ground hard, but he knows he deserves it. His strength to remain resistant against Dean's attack is not welcome here and Cas has hardly a claim to any angelic enhancements anymore. So he takes it. When Dean punches him, he takes it, feels his head snap to the side, his jaw pierced with stabbing pain, but he makes no move to stop it.

When it does, and Cas allows himself to look back up to where Dean stands, he sees the hunter flexing his hand, fire in his eyes slowly burning down to ash and five minutes later, a hand extends towards him. Cas flinches before he recognises the gesture and takes Dean's hand carefully. He experiences disorientation as he is hauled back up, backed up by the pain in his jaw.

"I think you broke it."

"Good." Dean says, then chuckles and shakes his head. Cas is confused by this. "I thought your angel mojo would protect you from that? It usually does."

"It would not have helped you express your anger."

"So what, you let me punch your face in just so I can _show_ you how mad I am? Damn it Cas, you're meant to be perceptive."

"You're upset." Cas states, matter-of-factly, and Dean wants to punch him all over again.

"Of course I'm _upset_. You went against us. Bobby is dead because of _you_. Sam went _insane_ because of _you_. Want me to go on?"

Cas doesn't answer. He lets his head fall and closes his eyes. There are no excuses in his mind because he has no reasons for them. Humanity never reached his soul to modify it like that. All he has is apologies and confusion.

"Why'd you do it? Why didn't you _listen_ to us when we told you to stop?" Dean seethes.

"Possessing those souls… You cannot imagine how much power they had. There is a reason angels are so different from humans. We must all have a balance. If every race just built on each other, retaining all their strengths… I did not mean for it to happen, Dean. But by then, the souls were already feeding off of my senses. All that evil manifested itself in my actions and it became almost a reflex. It was… painful. As though I was simply a… vessel used against my wish."

"Yeah you'd know all about that wouldn't you?"

"I have never acquired a vessel that way Dean." The sternness of his reply takes Dean aback. "Jimmy was willing. He prayed for this and I have never wanted to pain him as much as those souls did me. It was hell, Dean. And that, you should know all about."

What remains in Dean's mind when Cas disappears in front of him in a flurry of feathers, angry rustling, is the last expression of pure grief on the angel's face. And Dean recognises it for the same grief that flooded him recalling all the tortured souls Dean had helped rip apart in Hell. Involuntary, but nevertheless his own deeds.

Dean shouts "Crap." at nobody and nothing in particular when he realises that his anger at Cas has dissipated into a hollow numbness, a guilty feeling, and slams the door of the Impala hard enough to make the car sway from side to side.

* * *

Meg tells him Cas is getting worse when he stops visiting Dean and there's a small part of him that almost prays for the angel's presence. He tells himself it's only because he knows how much pain Sam was in and for his brother's sake doesn't want it to happen to anyone else.

* * *

Sam doesn't understand why they're driving back to the Asylum. He says if Dean wanted Cas or Meg's advice it would be much easier to call them. They even had a phone to do so for insurance.

The bare, grey walls of the block shaped prison greet him with no more enthusiasm than Cas does when Dean enters the padded cell.

"If it makes you happier, I'll tell them to paint some clouds on your walls. Make you feel more at home."

Cas' eyelids flutter and a smile passes through his lips, but his eyes remain closed, body planted firmly on the steel bed, knuckles white.

"Look Cas, I… I think I get it. I can't afford to have another enemy right now and…" he hunts for words, rifles through a vocabulary of _forgive_'s and _forget_'s because that's still not appropriate to say but it's getting closer. "I just want to say that if it really helps… y'know. Being around me. Then I don't mind you… being there."

* * *

It takes two weeks for Dean to stop jumping when Cas flies in and enters an on-going conversation with a wise and totally unrelated fact. It takes a month before Sam stops shouting "Geez!" whenever Cas does so.

* * *

They stop at a motel for the night, Sam holding back Dean when his brother ("thank you very much. We're _related_.") tries to punch the concierge for suggesting they take the honeymoon suite. From next door, Dean can still hear his brother's heavy breathing, knows he's asleep. Too awake to follow Sam's lead, he decided to take a shower, lets the hot water prickle over his skin and wash away the grime of two days on the road from dawn till dusk. When he comes out, clothes feeling odd against his clean again skin, hair dripping on the cheap wooden floor, he merely rolls his eyes at Castiel's figure, standing next to the window, nimble fingers pulling back the moth-eaten curtains and gazing at the darkness of the street with something akin to concern.

"I'm warnin' you." Dean says. "I haven't slept in a bed for at least a week, so if you're hoping for some shut-eye, you're gonna have to get your own room or take the floor."

"I do not require sleep." Castiel answers defiantly, even as he falls back into a chair heavily, and it reminds Dean of the impetuous actions of a child.

"Sure you don't."

"I meant to be here sooner. But the guards were watching me. It seems the pattern of my disappearance has been noticed."

"What, they figured that it was odd that you were only screaming in agony at certain times anymore? No shit."

"There is no need to belittle me with your sarcasm, Dean. I grow rather weary of it."

Dean raises an eyebrow, surprised at Cas' sudden annoyance. Cas notices. "Your… friend. I'm afraid she has finally managed to breach my patience." the word _friend_ rolls off Cas' tongue with unease and disgust.

"Meg? What's she doing?"

"I believe you call it insinuation. She finds it rather… amusing, the cause of my tormenter's sudden vanishing."

"You mean that your freak brother doesn't bug you around me?"

"I do not require you to parrot my every word, Dean. That is what I said." At this, Dean lowers his eyebrow again, turning his back on Cas, busies himself with the minibar.

"I apologise." Cas says a moment later. "I had no reason to anger you."

"Don't worry 'bout it. So what's Meg been 'insinuating'?"

When Cas doesn't answer, Dean shrugs, mutters "Fine" under his breath and empties the scotch in his hand with a single gulp before flopping down on the mattress and closing his eyes. When he feels Cas' eyes on him after ten minutes still, he mutters "Cas. Anyone ever tell you the part of human interactions where watching someone sleep is creepy?"

Hearing no reply, Dean thinks for a moment that maybe the angel has gone again and almost feels foolish for talking to an empty room. For some reason the thought of Cas just taking off upsets him more than he wants.

"It is by no means an original thought. Half the garrison amused themselves with these… jokes." The last word is said with distaste. Cas hates jokes. They confuse him. Dean knows that.

"Great. Half of Heaven thinks I'm gay. What more could I possibly want?"

"Half of Heaven and Hell, it seems."

Dean snorts. "Okay, I'll bite. What about it upsets you that much? I didn't even know you actually _got _the insinuations." He can't tell if he's more confused at Cas' annoyance or at his own lack of it.

"It is not of consequence." Cas states flatly and disappears, a little too fast. When Dean calls his name to summon him back, he is answered with silence.

* * *

Dean starts to notice small things over the next weeks. The way Meg smirks at him whenever she mentions Cas, the way Sam will alternate between pitying looks (and what the hell is up with that anyway?) and rolling his eyes at the name. He blames Cas for making him paranoid about the whole subject matter.

Cas' visits restrict themselves, again, to car-rides, the company of Sam drawing a barrier between them and the topics Dean refuses to think about to avoid a bout of annoyance.

* * *

A week has passed this time, since Cas' last visit. When Dean calls Meg, she simply smirks in her self-assured way, tells him his angel's been transferred to a heavier lockdown for attacking her. Dean barely notices the possessive pronoun she uses and by the time he does, she's blowing him a dissolving kiss, blackness wrapping around her figure, making her disappear again.

* * *

"Dean-" Castiel starts, barely getting out the word before Dean knocks him over with a shove only slightly less in its ferocity than the last time at the side of the road. He hits the hotel wall hard, too surprised to even consider letting himself feel the pain because maybe he deserves it and he would, for Dean's forgiveness. When he collects himself a second later and looks at the hunter, it makes his lip twitch in a pained smile.

"You were concerned about me." he reads from Dean's mind, and the hunter's corresponding expression is replaced by unimpressed, pure annoyance. Cas can't find it in his heart to apologise for reading Dean's actions this time.

"Meg said you were in lockdown."

"I was. She aggravated me."

"She's a demon. It's in their nature."

"Quite." Cas says, and from the amusement seeps once again, the tiredness. He's fought it off for as long as he could, now that Lucifer is gone again in Dean's presence, all the pain bears back down on him like thick, melted lead, weighing him down with each drop, solidifying upon meeting his slumped body.

Dean asks "How are you?" and tries hard to suppress any care behind the words.

Cas answers with a weary look, but says "Unchanged." nonetheless, too caught up in his angelic pride to admit to pain and give in to Lucifer's tormenting.

After he pours himself a scotch, Dean offers Cas some and hands him a glass. Cas takes the bottle instead, empties it within five seconds and looks back up at Dean, tumbler against his open mouth, eyes confused and concerned.

"That bad, huh?" Dean says finally, swallows the sickly sweet liquor, barely aware of the bitter aftertaste anymore. He concentrates on the warmth spreading through his body instead, as always.

Cas doesn't answer this time, and they sit in silence, Cas slumped in one chair by the small makeshift table the motel had to offer when Dean asked, Dean in the other, nursing his glass and watching the drink swish around the border, like waves crashing against the shore.

"I require knowledge." Cas says and Dean takes another sip, because in this cryptic mood, Dean needs to be drunk to deal with the angel.

"Read a book. Sam's got plenty."

"I don't think mythology could provide me with the answers I need."

Dean sighs. "Google?"

"Excuse me?"

"Never mind."

It's odd then, if not that Cas invades his personal space, then that Dean finds himself unable to move ( and he's really not _that_ drunk, is he? ), but the next thing he knows, the angel has got up, surprisingly unaffected by having just drunk half a bottle of whisky liquor, and moved towards him.

Dean feels a gentle, shy hand against his cheek, chapped lips that brush his almost with reverence, then harder, more insistent, searching for a response, searching for answers. Stubble against his chin and the smell of rain, of sunshine, of a sea of down pillows.

When Cas leans back enough for the hunter to breathe, Dean feels their breaths mingle and realises that the only feeling he has in response to what just happens is a craving for moremoremore and the odd sensation that this was long overdue. He clears his throat instead, tries to ask a question that Cas can only hear because he's still so close. "So, uh… what… the hell?"

"I needed to know if what half of Heaven and Hell thought was right."

"Huh." Dean mumbles and for god's sake he's never fucking _mumbled_ before.

"It seems I owe Meg an apology then." Cas states again, makes to straighten up again and flutter away in that infuriatingly evasive manner of his.

Dean snatches the lapels of the trench coat, says "Shut up." to Cas and any heavenly and hellish audience they may have, damns them all to the opposite place they're in right now and kisses Cas again hard.

When Sam knocks on his door half an hour later, Dean damns him to Timbuktu too, just for good measure.

* * *

_fin._


End file.
